Aquarius
NBC | Release Date: May 28, 2015
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
58
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 39 Critic Reviews
Positive:
19
Mixed:
17
Negative:
3
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
60
PopMattersCynthia FuchsMay 28, 2015
Season 1 Review: Aquarius isn’t quite history, but it also isn’t precisely now, or even accurate. Read full review
60
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteRob OwenMay 28, 2015
Season 1 Review: There's nothing egregiously wrong with Aquarius--it's sometimes dull but also at turns surprising--but with so many options for entertainment content today, this NBC procedural-serial hybrid doesn't do much to stand out. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsDavid HinckleyMay 27, 2015
Season 1 Review: Aquarius sets up several subplots that are nicely turned, and as ’60s pieces go, it’s hardly the worst. It just doesn’t quite make you feel you’re there. Read full review
58
The A.V. ClubNoel MurrayMay 28, 2015
Season 1 Review: Aquarius struggles with how to integrate the Manson family into the action without diminishing the evil still to come. It’s most successful when it sticks to the small details, like the squalid conditions of the Manson compound, or how touchy he could be about his rock-star dreams. Read full review
58
Entertainment WeeklyJeff JensenMay 21, 2015
Season 1 Review: Beyond the rockin’ soundtrack, the flat storytelling has no pop. Read full review
50
TimeJames PoniewozikMay 28, 2015
Season 1 Review: Sheerly as a crime story, Aquarius goes down easy enough, but it lacks particularly fresh ideas either on its setting or its genre. Read full review
50
Las Vegas WeeklyJosh BellMay 28, 2015
Season 1 Review: Too much about Aquarius is boilerplate cop-drama material; by the second episode, Shafe and Hodiak are investigating other cases while the Manson plot plays out over the long term. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesRobert LloydMay 28, 2015
Season 1 Review: The series works best when it stays clear of the issues and concentrates on individuals, acting as people do. (This was true of "Mad Men" too, after all.) The more strongly it indicates the era, the more it resembles an old episode of "Dragnet." Read full review
50
HitfixAlan SepinwallMay 27, 2015
Season 1 Review: By starting the story so long before the deaths of Sharon Tate and Manson's other victims, though.... the next several episodes devote most of their time to the detectives investigating crimes that either tangentially involve Manson or have nothing at all to do with him, but are there to fulfill the Case of the Week structure most network procedural cop shows depend on. Read full review
50
Philadelphia Daily NewsEllen GrayMay 27, 2015
Season 1 Review: Aquarius touches, not very subtly, on issues of race, gender and sexual preference while pursuing a story involving Manson that's complicated but not actually as compelling as some of the lesser subplots. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleDavid WiegandMay 27, 2015
Season 1 Review: Aquarius is watchable, but oddly bland, given its subject matter. It’s not so much “Helter Skelter” as it is “The Long and Winding Road.” Read full review
50
VarietyBrian LowryMay 26, 2015
Season 1 Review: Created by John McNamara, and representing some of his most ambitious work in years, Aquarius--which wisely draws heavily on the songs of the time--is big and messy, a much more direct hit on the mores of the time than something like “Mad Men.” Read full review
42
NewsdayVerne GayMay 27, 2015
Season 1 Review: With feet of clay, Aquarius plods relentlessly toward a climax everyone already knows, while making just enough fictional detours to make the journey truly exasperating. Read full review
40
New York Magazine (Vulture)Margaret LyonsMay 28, 2015
Season 1 Review: The show's strengths--Duchovny's smarm-tinted megacharm, a functional police procedural--don't seem like quite enough to make people desperate for another chapter. Read full review
40
RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoMay 27, 2015
Season 1 Review: Anthony makes for a charismatic maniac. It’s the thinness of the filmmaking and the unfocused narrative that frustrates. Read full review
40
Wall Street JournalNancy DeWolf SmithMay 21, 2015
Season 1 Review: Sometimes it works, and we do get to see the already languorous Mr. Duchonvy act like he’s on an acid trip. Much of the time, though, this show set in the era of LSD feels more like a dose of Thorazine. Read full review
40
The Huffington PostMaureen RyanMay 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: David Duchovny is good in all of his scenes in the two-hour Aquarius pilot (which is all I could get through), but the rest of the cast for the period drama is unimpressive. Read full review
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